The car stopped at the end of the rutted road. In front of us lay the field where Company F of the 507th Parachute Infantry Regiment had jumped on March 24, 1945. My husband, with his yellowed military field map in hand, stared at the landscape with unbelieving eyes.

(This story was submitted after the Herald ran a story about five Whatcom County soldiers who died in Vietnam and whose photographs were being sought for a “Wall of Faces” memorial affiliated with the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C. One of the five soldiers was Dewain...